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Women's unequal political representation remains a problem all over the world, including in Albania. Women constitute approximately 50 percent of the 2.88 million people in Albania but, only 28 percent of Albanian parliamentary seats are held by women.
“Barriers to women's participation in... Read More

Ashley Bruggemann

I recently traveled to Ghana as an observer to support IRI’s research project on identifying the barriers to women’s participation in political parties. This was my second trip to Ghana, having first visited this thriving democracy in 2016 when I served as part of a delegation that conducted a pre-... Read More

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Hellen Muchunu

As the looming issue of rehabilitation and reintegration of foreign fighters begins to saturate the Western Balkans, policy leaders are grappling to understand and identify early warning signs that lead to radicalization, learning the dynamics and profiles of those vulnerable to radicalization, and... Read More

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Mercedes Blackwood

As a key bridge between citizens and decision-makers, strengthening civil society supports a citizen-oriented and citizen-driven approach to promoting democracy. To this end, IRI’s Civil Society Community of Practice is conducting a series of interviews with current and former civil society... Read More

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Chessy Gortzounian

Under the oppressive Taliban regime, Naheed Farid was forced to drop out of school. Witnessing the denial of rights to Afghan women for years, she dedicated her career to empowering women.
In Afghanistan, barriers to women’s leadership begin at a young age with lack of education for girls. The... Read More

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Jessica Sykes

Lacey Darling

In honor of International Women's Day, the Women's Democracy Network (WDN) will feature four of our members from around the world. Each woman comes from a different background and has a different story, but they embody many of same qualities; determination, passion... Read More

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Morgan Martinez

Ilze Vinkele is a former member of Parliament from Latvia, where she also served as the Minister of Welfare. Vinkele has implemented several significant public sector reforms, such as raising the retirement age, reforming mental-health institutions and defending the rights of LGBT individuals.
In... Read More

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Ashley Bruggemann

The Women’s Democracy Network (WDN) has developed a framework to identify key barriers to women’s political engagement. The “SheVotes” gender assessment toolkit can inform the design of interventions to increase women’s political participation and leadership.
In partnership with IRI’s... Read More

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Ashley Bruggemann

Tanja Tomic, a former member of the Macedonia Parliament, is a member of the Women’s Democracy Network– in fact, she attended WDN’s inaugural Europe regional conference in Skopje in 2005.
Tanja has served as a trainer and facilitator for WDN throughout the years... Read More

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Ashley Bruggemann

Georgia gained independence from the Soviet Union 25 years ago, but it has only been recently that those elections have been deemed mostly free and fair. Under Georgian law, men and women have equal rights as voters and candidates, but women’s representation in politics remains incredibly low.... Read More